Forry,
Thanks for starting a great thread.
You are right on the apples to apples comparison. But you forgot to mention among all of the other regulations the PITA requirement of have to have your boat disinfected for the Q at an additional cost of $30. ;-)
There doesn't appear to be an easy solution to your original question. But there are many good viewpoints / thoughts expressed here.
Expounding on a couple of those ideas...
Setting up a trophy brown trout fishery possibly in lakes other than Winni would help ease the pressure on the big lake. But F&G has to provide decent access to fishermen. For example Cobbetts pond in Windham has a decent population of large browns fed by alewives but is only accessible to ice fisherman. But homeowners locked it down from non-landowner boats.
Another example comes to mind is Pleasant Lake in New London from what I am told that has a very healthy population of trophy LL salmon but again no public access.
Maybe spending some of those F&G dollars to purchase land for public access (a nice state beach & campground brings in more $$$) will help create better fishing for the whole state.
It doesn't make sense to me for the state to stock a body of water without providing public access.
Again just my .02
